On Tonight: A Football Game and Some Other Stuff

Today is Super Bowl Sunday, so in addition to the game of Packers vs.
Steelers (Fox, today, 6:30 p.m.) there is also the high-priced commercials, a
national antmem from Christina Aguilera, the halftime show with the Black
Eyed Peas, and an endless pre-game buildup starting at 2 p.m.

It's all followed by a special postgame episode of "Glee" (Fox, 10:30 p.m.), which
wouldn't be the first series I would associate with football fans. In it, they mash up Michael Jackson's "Thriller" with the yeah Yeah Yeah's "Heads Will Roll." Also in the mix tonight: Lady Antebellum's "Need You Now," the Zombies' "She's Not There" and Destiny Child's "Bills, Bills, Bills."

It's become a tradition to
have the president talk with a representative of the network broadcasting the
Super Bowl. Today, it's Fox, so the interviewer is Bill O'Reilly of Fox News,
who brags that the 15 minute exchange scheduled for 4:45 p.m. will be "the
most-watched interview in history."

One of the least watched? John Gotti Jr. talking to "60 Minutes" (CBS, 7
p.m.).

The 100th anniversary of Ronald Reagan's birth today doesn't get much notice locally. Judy Woodruff's hour-long interview with his wife, "Nancy Reagan: The Role of a Lifetime" (WGBY, Channel 57, 10 p.m.; CPTV, 2 a.m.) is pushed to the wee hours locally. It's a tough journalistic job for her; she tries to get in al the news about the age of Reagan, but in a production funded in part by George Schultz and Alan Greenspan, the overall portrait is positive, of course.

The cutest of the alternate programming will undoubtedly be Puppy Bowl VII (Animal Planet, 3, 5, 7
and 9 p.m.). But there are also marathons of things from "Jersey Shore" (MTV, noon) to "Sex and the City" (E!,
noon).

Two reruns of "Who Do You Think You Are?" (NBC, 7 and 8 p.m.) features
Friday's second season premiere, and last season's investigation into producer
Lisa Kudrow's past.

The man who got in the jam in "127 Hours" talks about his experience on "Dateline"
(NBC, 9 p.m.).

Most networks go with reruns or movies against the game. But "Big Love"
(HBO, 9 p.m.) goes big, with a new episode.

In the 31 Days of Oscars on Turner Movie Classics, they spotlight films that won in categories that are no longer awarded: "Sunrise" (8 p.m.) for "best unique and artistic quality of performance"; "Wings" (10 p.m.) for "best engineering effects"; "The House on 92nd St." (12:30 a.m.) for best story; "Viva Villa!" (2:15 a.m.) for best assistant director and "A Damsel in Distress" (4:15 a.m.) for best dance direction.

Men's college hoops include Michigan State at Wisconsin (CBS, 1 p.m.), American at Lehigh (CBSCS, 2 p.m.) Ohio State at Minnesota (ESPN, 2 p.m.), Florida State at North Carolina (NESN, 2 p.m.) and Marist at Niagara (MSG, 3 p.m.).

ABC: Christiane Amanpour eporting from Cairo. CBS: Martin Indyk, vice
president and director of Foreign Policy at the Brookings Institution; Thomas
Pickering, former U.S. ambassador to the U.., srael and Jordan; Dr. Abderrahim
Foukara, Al Jazeera, Washington and New York Bureau Chief. NBC: Sen. John
Kerry, former secretary of state James Baker. CNN: former secretary of state
Madeleine Albright, former U.S. Ambassador to Egypt Edward Walker; John
Negroponte, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations; Sen. Alan Simpson. Fox News:
NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, Hall of Famer Lynn Swann and former Pakers
lineman Jerry Kramer.

Categories:

Roger Catlin is TV critic for the Hartford Courant and writes a daily column about what's on television called TV Eye. He is also on the board of the Television Critics Association. Before all of this, he was rock critic ... read more